Center

Chapter 331 Too Long Winter Break
Opportunities are reserved for those who are prepared.

For this sentence, Long Bisheng has a deep understanding. He himself is a person who will do everything he can do regardless of the external environment, and then seize the opportunity when it comes. If he did not have such characteristics, he would not be able to fill the gap between him and Dai Guangming who had more than five years of formal training in ten years.

This is very similar to Hoffenheim.

This is also a team that is usually ready and can seize the opportunity.

When they were promoted to the Bundesliga in their first season, as newly promoted, their goal should have been to stay in the Bundesliga, but that season was a chaotic season in the Bundesliga. Due to the lack of coaching experience of the Bundesliga, Kahn, who had been serving as a defensive barrier, announced his retirement, which caused the Bundesliga giant Bayern to fall into chaos. Points and the most efficient shooter in the Bundesliga, then they might really be able to replicate Kaiserslautern's miracle back then.

Even so, after Ibisevic was injured, the relegated Hoffenheim still tried their best to play the rest of the league. Although they failed to enter the European arena due to overall strength, they left a deep impression on the hearts of Bundesliga and fans all over the world.

In the second season, Hoffenheim played steadily. While stabilizing their position, they also officially became one of the top teams in the Bundesliga. Being able to enter the European arena is the best proof of their performance.

And when the third season came, Hoffenheim, who had been preparing for two years, believed that this season would be their chance to explode after two seasons of accumulation!

They are now ranked third in the Bundesliga standings. Although they are five points away from Bayern at the top of the list, they are only two points away from Wolfsburg in second place.

So, after the resumption of the winter break, there were two consecutive league rounds, one game a week, and the opponents were not particularly strong. Rangnick had already put six points in the two games into the plan—the home game against Nuremberg and the away game against Hannover 96.

But in the first game after the winter break, Lannick's plan was shattered.

At the Rhein-Neckar Stadium, facing an opponent who had won [-]-[-] away in the first round, the Hoffenheim players seemed to have rested too much during the one-month winter break, and their running on the field was not as active as before.

When Hoffenheim lost the running ability they depended on in the Bundesliga, what was left?
The first half of the game seems to have given the answer to this question-the third-ranked Hoffenheim did not show the strength in line with their ranking in front of the No.

In front of Nuremberg, which is active in running, aggressive in pressing and fierce in counterattack, Hoffenheim was crushed under the eyes of [-] fans at the Rhein-Neckar Stadium. The Nuremberg attacking trident headed by Mintal created no fewer than five chances. If Li Jie hadn't been rushing from left to right in the backcourt, and Hildebrand hadn't made brilliant saves, Hoffenheim might have been beaten into a sieve in the first half.

Even so, Hoffenheim failed to keep the goal in the first half. In the 303rd minute, Nuremberg once again played a successful counterattack. In the end, Mintal scored the ball from the center and assisted the forward full-back to pass into the penalty area.

It was not until the beginning of the second half that the Hoffenheim players seemed to wake up and began to run wildly on the field-only after running, Hoffenheim's offense was alive and could exhaust the opponent's defenders like a tide. Only then did the Hoffenheim fans familiar with Hoffenheim return to the fans!
Whether it was aroused by the backward situation, or Rangnick roared at the players during the half-time break-it is estimated that the latter was the majority-Hoffenheim finally returned to normal conditions, and the advantage began to gradually return to their side.

But a goal lead allowed Nuremberg to adopt intensive defensive tactics in the second half. At the same time, their morale was much higher than that of Hoffenheim due to their advantage in the first half.

Although they had resumed their usual game state, Hoffenheim still played very hard. Facing the dense defense and the opponent's fighting spirit that was almost ready to use their bodies to block the shot at any time, they were not able to quickly turn their advantage into a victory.

The longer the time passed, the worse it was for Hoffenheim, and the more exciting Nuremberg's defense became.

Long Bisheng has been running, perhaps because he has been training hard during the winter break and did not enjoy life in a warm tourist resort like other teammates, so he, like Li Jie, became one of the few Hoffenheim players who performed normally in the first half.

In the first half, his range of running covered the frontcourt, effectively restraining the opponent's pressing attack. If it weren't for his running without hesitation, Nuremberg would definitely have scored more than one goal, because in many cases in the first half, as long as Nuremberg can add strength, Hoffenheim's defense can collapse again.

After the start of the second half, he fought more with the opponent's two central defenders in the penalty area. Since Hoffenheim had the midfield advantage in the second half, his performance became more important.

To deal with an opponent who is fully defended, there are only a few offensive methods, and the long pass directly blasts the opponent's door open, which is the most effective method.

Long Bisheng's impact made Nuremberg's main central defender Domenech Maro miserable. He is more than ten centimeters shorter than Long Bisheng in height. Although there are many teammates in the penalty area to help, as long as Hoffenheim's cross can reach the top of Long Bisheng's head, it can pose a huge threat to the gate of Nuremberg.

In the 207th minute of the second half, Marin once again broke through the opponent's defense on the side. When the defenders of Nuremberg were all focused on Long Bisheng, who was the most threatening during this period, Marin did not choose to pass the ball to the front of the goal, but directly picked the ball to the front of the penalty area.

Gustavo rushed up from behind, he received a pass from Marin, and then used all his strength to blast a long shot before the opponent's defender came up!
The ball passed through the shadows in the penalty area smoothly, then dropped suddenly when it was close to the goal, and flew into the dead corner of the goal!
Relying on Gustavo's world wave, Hoffenheim tied the score, but failed to help them bring victory.

Until the end of the game, Hoffenheim had a chance to overtake the score, but Long Bisheng's header was ruthlessly blocked by the goal post!

In the end, Hoffenheim paid the price for their sluggish first half. The draw allowed them to watch Bayern extend their lead to seven points after defeating Rostock.
Rangnick did not criticize the players much in the press conference after the game. He attributed the draw to the fact that the winter break was too long, and the players lost their good form before the start of the winter break: "In fact, we reached our peak in December. Unfortunately, our luck was not so good. The winter break came when we could continue to win... But I am very satisfied with the performance of the players in the second half. We had five or six opportunities to change the score. Unfortunately, this is football."

In front of the media, Lannick acted generously, as if he was not too angry about the draw, but in reality?
He was 10 minutes late for the press conference. During these 10 minutes, he only did one thing, and that was to criticize all the players who performed poorly in the first half in the locker room, including Hoffenheim's most famous player Ibisevic. Except for Hildebrand, Li Jie and Long Bisheng who performed normally in the first half, no one was spared.

None of the players who were scolded dared to speak out. They did not perform very well. I am sorry for their current worth and reputation.

The long winter break is the advantage of the Bundesliga, which allows their players to maintain sufficient physical fitness after the start of the second half of the season, so that the second half of the season is as exciting as the first half of the season, but everything has to be viewed in two - After a month-long rest, it is not easy to quickly return to the game state.

This may be one of the reasons why the German Football Association shortened the winter break, which might have lasted until early February, to the end of January. The winter break of the Bundesliga might have been around Valentine's Day.

Hoffenheim also suffered from this kind of suffering. When their hearts were still on the sunny beach and the feasting nightclubs, they could not quickly tighten their nerves and reach the professional level.

It seems that Rangnick is really angry, angry at the slackness of the players, and also angry at the two points lost-after being drawn by Nuremberg, although Hoffenheim is still third, they have been narrowed by teams such as Hamburg and Leverkusen behind them.
(End of this chapter)